Nir took it up. “Which meant he was either a really good swimmer with a waterproof phone or he was on a boat.”

“Achla! You’re smarter than you look,” Liora said. “So we got Yossi to use his ship-finding software, and it turns out the same boat was at each location—the Cafala Bahr.”

“Why do I know that name?” Nir asked.

Nicole had a wide smile across her face. “I’ll tell you why. Saad Salim.”

“There you go,” Yossi said.

“The originals guy!” cried Nir. “That’s the sleazeball who—”

“Yes, I remember,” said Nicole coolly.

Nir took the hint. She didn’t want to go over that again. “What’s the connection? How do they know each other?”

“We don’t know yet,” Liora said. “But there’s more.”

“Achla! Bring it on.”

“We wanted to know if anyone else of interest was on that boat while he was there,” Dafna said. “So we checked out all the other signals. Most of them stayed with the yacht, obviously from the crew. Then there was Salim. But one other signal has shown up there over 20 times in the last two years. Three of those were when Kamal was there. We followed it, and each time it went back to Iran.”

“Wait a second,” Nicole said. “I think I met this guy. What’s his name?”

“General Arash Mousavi, head of the Intelligence Division of the Quds Force of the IRGC.” Nir said the last part of that sentence along with Dafna. Turning to Nicole, he said, “You never told me you met Arash Mousavi.”

“I never knew I met Arash Mousavi. I just knew the guy’s first name. I hadn’t heard of him until now, and honestly, I’m getting a little creeped out that I was on a yacht with someone you know by name.” Her face had turned pale, and Nir could see fear in her eyes. He knew that, mentally, she was probably right back in that interrogation room in Iran. Dafna went over and squatted next to her, putting her arm around her.

Nicole kind of laughed and said, “I’m fine. Really. Go on.”

But Nir was glad to see Dafna remain with her.

“So we’ve got a terrorism financier, an IRGC general, and a Saudi prince,” he said.

“Sounds like the beginning of a bad bar joke,” Dima added.

“True. But what’s the connection? I guess if Kamal really is planning a coup, then it would make sense. From what I remember, Salim has a grudge against the royals for how they treated his dad too. So either he’s in on it or he’s just the go-between. You’ve got Kamal wanting to take down the Saudis. But unless he has a bunch of generals on his side, he can’t pull it off.”

“The Iranians hate the Saudis, but they’re not going to fight in a coup,” Doron said.